The Recruit
by WhiteHare
Summary: June 1917. John Mitchell meets vampires on a misty WW1 battlefield. My interpretation of his recruitment, denial and subsequent eager acceptance of his new life. *** complete ***
1. Chapter 1

**When I first watched BH the battlefield recruitment of John Mitchell interested me. What deal was struck and how between Mitchell and Herrick? Then series 3 and the revelation that Mitchell ran away from Herrick and went back to his regiment for four weeks - that Arthur was his first kill - made me wonder even more what the chain of events were. **

**The trench rotation in WW1 appears to have been a week or so in the front line, a week or so in the reserves and then a couple of days rest, so this four week period is roughly two rotations, assuming Mitchell had been at the front for a few days before his recruitment. **

**None of the characters are mine, sadly. They all belong to Toby Whithouse and the BBC - and fabulous they are too.**

**Rated for occasional language.**

**This fic has given me serious grief and I'm not sure what I think of it, so please leave a review if you like it. :)**

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><p>There was good hunting to be had that June. Food was plentiful – a glut of the dying littering the ground like windfall apples in the autumn. No need to be careful; no-one would ask questions about two small puncture wounds when a man's life had clearly ebbed away through a bullet hole in his chest or been blown away with the better part of his leg.<p>

The battlefields of France in 1917 were a good place to be a vampire. They spent much of their time sated, blood drunk and sure of their supremacy. Let the humans blow themselves to pieces, stepping out their dance of death fighting over a few yards of mud and craters. The vampires had been around before this war and they would be there long after. They believed themselves the next step up the evolutionary ladder: the supreme predator.

William Herrick watched as Seth feasted, taking as much pleasure on this occasion from observing the spectacle as from participating. He kept only a casual watch – the patrol and subsequent skirmish that had put paid to this soldier's life had taken place a little away from the main forces and they expected to feed undisturbed. So Herrick was surprised when Seth looked up and past him at a lone soldier stumbling out of the mist, hands tight on the stock of his rifle. The soldier's eyes widened as he took in the butchery, struggling to comprehend what was happening in front of him, but the sudden intake of breath and increase in his heart rate at the sight of Seth's fangs, jet-black eyes and blood-smeared face told Herrick that he had become a danger to them. The man had witnessed vampires feeding on the dying; he could not be allowed to leave the scene alive.

Herrick's face contorted in a ghastly echo of a smile: eyes black as night and teeth bared to show the fangs descending. He hissed his warning at the young man, his features revealing the monster within, and took a few menacing steps forward.

The soldier's hands tightened convulsively on his rifle. "Don't come any closer! I'll shoot!" His gaze flickered to the body on the ground by Seth, horror shadowing his face as he registered the uniform, the regimental badges. "Jesus! What are you doing to him? Leave him alone." He barely choked the words out through a throat constricted with fear.

Seth's face creased into a grisly leer, blood rimming his mouth. "One of your friends, was he?" He ran his tongue slowly round his teeth, smiling cruelly at the soldier. "He was very tasty."

"What the hell are you? I'll kill you, I swear I will." The man's voice, heavy with Irish accent, was thick with fear. He levelled the rifle to point at Herrick's chest, squaring his shoulders in an attempt to look braver than he felt. Herrick could almost taste the terror – could feel the blood pounding around the young man's veins, smell the adrenaline flooding through him – the hormones screaming at him to run! Run for his life. Ah, the temptation Herrick felt to let go: instincts begging him to rip and tear and pierce fragile skin with his fangs.

But no, that could come later. Herrick forced his features to return to normal; he would toy with this one a while before killing him – a grotesque game of cat and mouse. "Kill me? With what,soldier? A bullet or the bayonet? Go on, give that oversized toothpick of yours a try. Stomach or chest, you're told, aren't you? Go on, if you've got the guts for it. You've killed at a distance, I dare say – can you look into a man's eyes and kill him?"

Behind Herrick, Seth grinned at the soldier, a nasty, sneering smile that taunted and derided. "Don't play with your food, Herrick. If you're not going to eat him then let me have him; I've acquired quite a taste for Irish blood. This one here was very flavoursome."

"Stay back I say." The soldier cast a furtive look at Seth and the other vampire as they began to circle round behind him, cutting off his retreat. He brandished his gun again, his finger curling possessively round the trigger. Herrick was the leader; he kept the gun pointing steadily at his chest.

Herrick made a show of counting the vampires. "One, two, three of us against one of you. I don't fancy your odds, old son."

"I'm not alone. I lost my men in the mist. They'll be here to support me in a minute." The soldier gave a fleeting look over his shoulder, looking more anxious as he realised he had been outflanked.

Herrick chuckled. "Do you hear that, lads? He's just the appetiser. The main course is coming." The others laughed – a dark, bitter laugh that made the soldier pale and lick his lips nervously.

"I've got a gun."

"So you have. You're not putting it to much use, though. I thought you were going to turn me into a pin cushion. What's stopping you?" The soldier gripped his rifle stock tighter. "Not got the guts? I'm disappointed in you. Go on, right here." Herrick opened the front of his greatcoat and pointed at his stomach encouragingly. The soldier stood his ground. Herrick sighed and rolled his eyes. "I can see I'm going to have to give you an incentive." His eyes scorched black and his fangs bared once more as he strode forwards.

The soldier thrust wildly with his bayonet, stabbing at the khaki-clad stomach of the vampire. He managed to make contact, twisting the blade before tugging it out and taking a few hasty steps backwards, to find his arms held firmly by two vampires, his rifle swiftly removed from hands made feeble by terror. Herrick grunted and clutched at his stomach, doubling over to protect the wound, blood already seeping from between his fingers. He raised his shirt and probed the gash, his fingertips coming away red with blood. The blood streamed steadily for a few brief seconds but slowed and quickly stopped. Herrick spoke through gritted teeth. "For the record, that bloody hurt. That twist was brutal; straight in and out would have sufficed. Not deep, though – did you bottle it at the last minute?"

Herrick winced a little, fingering the wound which was already showing signs of closing. "Nice clean wound and not too much blood lost." The vampire calmly replaced his shirt and buttoned his coat, the only clue that he had suffered an injury the bloody hole in his shirt front and a hissed intake of breath from the vampire as he straightened up. "Good, so you do have the balls for a fight, then; I thought I saw it in you. As well for you, too – I'd have killed you where you stood if you hadn't fought back. But now you see the flaw in your plan. Trying to kill someone who is to all intents and purposes already dead is at best futile and at worst...just plain stupid. I could do with a top up now and I think Seth has about emptied your pal over there. Didn't you say your men were right behind you? Maybe one of them would oblige..."

"No! Not them!" Herrick was startled by the vehemence of the man's tone. Behind him, in the murkiness of the wood, the soldier could hear noises: muffled calls in the swirling mist. The atmosphere grew tense as they listened to the voices growing closer. The vampires turned towards them, seeming to sniff the air as their prey approached. The soldier cast a despairing glance over his shoulder and when he looked back his eyes were at last full of the fear that Herrick had been sensing.

The soldier's voice was tinged with hysteria. "Take me. Take me instead of them. Let them go."

"You'd come of your own free will? A willing sacrifice?"

The soldier nodded mutely, his face tight and anxious. "Most of them have wives – families. God knows if they will make it to the end of the war, but at least they'd have a chance. And I'm dead already, it seems to me."

Herrick met the soldier, gaze for gaze; this man interested him. There was something about him that drew Herrick to him – he had guts, that was for sure, but there was something else. Loyalty, maybe? A sharpness that Herrick found sadly lacking in Seth. Herrick was picky about who he picked to recruit to the ranks of the vampires, but this man was ticking all of his boxes. Maybe death wasn't on the cards for him yet: at least not in the way he was expecting. "What's your name, son?"

"Mitchell. John Mitchell."

"Well, John Mitchell, you're right; I'm going to kill you. I'm going to suck your life away. The question is whether I give you new life for old."

"New life?"

"Do you want to be immortal, John?" Herrick smirked at the glimmer of interest in the young man's face. Of course, he was young – why wouldn't he crave immortality, especially in the face of imminent death? "How long have you been out here? How many of your comrades have you seen die? You've lived in the mud and the blood and the stench and been scared to the pit of your stomach, am I right? Yes, I can see in your eyes that I'm right. What if I was to tell you that you need never fear that again? Join us, John."

"I'd never die?"

"Well, certain exceptions apply; it's all in the small print. But essentially no, you'd never die. Not only that but you'd never age either. You'd stop at – what are you now – twenty three? Twenty four? Perfect. Sometimes I wish that I'd been turned a little earlier, but then the extra few years lend me a certain gravitas, I suppose – an air of authority."

The soldier hesitated. The offer seemed appealing, but...

"I need an answer, John. They are nearly here and if they see us we'll kill them, promise or no promise."

His eyes hardened. "Yes, do it."

"Of your own free will?"

"Yes, willingly, just do it." He looked over his shoulder again. The sounds were getting louder – his men were proceeding cautiously, wary of ambush or snipers, but they were definitely closer. "Jesus! They're coming! Just do it!"

"Close your eyes." Herrick's one act of mercy: to allow his prey to block out approaching death. The man gave a slight shake of the head. So he was determined to meet death with his eyes open, then: all the better. "Bare your neck, John."

"Mitchell," the words came out as a harsh rasp, "everyone calls me Mitchell."


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for the lovely reviews everyone! I do normally reply individually to every review, but for some reason FFN isn't letting me at the moment, so I'm sorry if you haven't had a personal thank you.**

**In response to a couple of comments, yes I _do_ love writing Herrick. After Mitchell, I liked Herrick best, so S3E8 was a real double-whammy for me! I love that when I write him I can hear Jason Watkin's voice so clearly in my head. A fantastic portrayal, so round of applause for Mr Watkins, please!**

**This instalment seems Mitchell's resurrection as a vampire and his immediate reaction to it. **

**Please leave a review if you enjoy it! :-)**

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><p>As the fangs bit down on his neck he did close his eyes, a tidal wave of pain enveloping him and his knees buckling from under him. Mitchell's eyes rolled as he started to lose consciousness. "I'm cold, so cold," he murmured, grasping at his attacker in an attempt to stay upright as his body started to shut down. Herrick caught him as he crumpled to the ground then resumed his feeding. He couldn't abandon himself to the pleasure of the feed – not if he was to recruit Mitchell. He had to stay aware – watch Mitchell's responses as his skin got clammy and his heart started to race to try to keep his body processes functioning. Herrick couldn't risk him dying before the transaction was complete.<p>

The critical moment arrived when Herrick had to turn his fangs on himself, piercing the skin of his wrist and holding the welling blood to Mitchell's mouth. "Drink. You must drink, soldier, or you'll die for keeps." He could feel the man slipping away, but managed to force a few precious drops of blood between his lips and was confident that was enough.

They had to leave him then, for a while at least; carrying him would have slowed them down and the soldiers were almost upon them. Seth was all for staying and killing Mitchell's men anyway, but William Herrick was a man of principle, in his own way, and he intended to see the deal done. It would give him a hold over Mitchell that would be hard to break: an honourable pact sealed in blood. Let them find their sergeant dead and carry the news back. John Mitchell would become another statistic on the list of killed in action, and start his new life as Herrick's man.

By Herrick's reckoning they had a good few hours until Mitchell would come round, although the time for a vampire transformation was an inexact science. Herrick and the others would return to the spot later to sit with the body and be with the new vampire when he returned from the dead. That was a distressing time for a new recruit: they had all experienced death, yet none of them spoke of what they had seen, even amongst themselves.

When they returned, they found the bodies from the clearing gathered together into a heap ready for the burial detail. Herrick and his men left the bodies as they were: no sense in disturbing them in case the burial party returned. If it came to it the burial party would die in order for them to protect the new vampire. Mitchell would be confused and distressed when he came round, but Herrick and his friends would try to stay under the wire if possible and a whole burial detail going missing would call undue attention to them.

Herrick stayed nearby and watched, waiting for his latest recruit to come back from whatever dark recess of his mind he was buried in. Mitchell wouldn't wake alone; Herrick would make sure of that.

Dusk was falling as Mitchell awoke, his eyes snapping open the same jet black that Herrick's had been when he killed him. He drew in a long shuddering breath and looked wildly about him, disoriented and distraught. Horrified, he realised he was lying with corpses; so many like them had been left where they fell to rot or be blown apart by shells, gradually consumed by the mud that had been churned up across great swathes of France. Crows hopped optimistically from man to man, ready to tear dead flesh from their bones. He could feel their claws as they brushed his face, flapping darkly away from him as they felt his movement.

Someone else had noticed him move. "Mitchell? Easy there, soldier," Herrick placed a hand on his shoulder, pushing him back as he struggled to get up. Mitchell was glad enough to submit. "You'll take a while to acclimatise. Take it easy – no rush to move."

"Jesus," he gasped, "what the hell was that? I saw..."

"I know," murmured Herrick. "It's not considered good form to tell people what will happen to them when they die. That's why I didn't warn you. Lie still a moment - you're shaking. Your body needs time to get used to the changes."

"There was a corridor. They were going to judge me – good things and bad things. And there were men there..." He turned agonised eyes to Herrick, now returned to their original brown. "Oh, Jesus Christ, Herrick, they were going to-" Mitchell covered his eyes with his hands and rolled over, his shoulders shaking as he fought back the memories of what he had seen.

Herrick waited for the reaction to subside. "Quiet now, lad. We'll get you out of here in a minute."

Mitchell wiped his face on his sleeve, ashamed of his weakness: aware of the grinning Seth ever in the background. He pushed himself up cautiously, steadying himself as his head swam. He didn't make any further attempt to talk about what he had seen, and Herrick was glad of that; those memories were only to be revisited in nightmares and best locked safely in the depths of ones mind. Waking as a vampire unmanned the bravest of them and he thought none the worse of Mitchell. He had seen strong men reduced to sobbing children as they woke from their encounter with the men with sticks and ropes.

The vampires hauled Mitchell to his feet and led him away - the burial party cheated of one corpse to lay to rest.

By the time they got him back to their base Mitchell was exhausted and fell asleep where they left him, fretful and muttering. Herrick once more watched over his new recruit, dozing in an armchair nearby while he slept and waking to check on him through the night. Vampire etiquette required the sire of a new vampire to tend to the newborn and care for them during the first few distressing days: Herrick intended to fulfil his side of the bargain.

It was fully light by the time Mitchell stirred and Seth had already been out for "groceries".

"Don't try to get up. Here, drink this." Seth handed Herrick a tin mug and Herrick held it to Mitchell's lips. He drank eagerly, suddenly hungry. The contents were warm and satisfying, sending new strength into his weakened body. That mug was followed by a second and this time Mitchell held it himself, passing it back empty to Herrick and wiping his mouth on the back of his hand. Mitchell stared, horrified, at the smear left behind, bright red and fresh against the dried mud and blood on his skin.

"Was that...? Ah, no, Jesus..." and he rolled onto his hands and knees, gagging and trying in vain to throw back up what he had just drunk.

"Hey, hey, what's all this? You need to eat, soldier. You need to get your strength back. See, you're looking better already – bit of blood inside you. We'll get you to feed again later – show you how to drink from a living person. It won't always come served up in a mug, you know; it normally comes in its own handy little wrapper." Herrick grinned; he wasn't averse to laughing at his own jokes. He seemed unperturbed by his recruit's reaction; it hit different people in different ways, and Mitchell's instinct to vomit wasn't that unusual. "Came over a bit queasy, did you? Yes, well, it can happen that way – your system needs to adjust, I dare say. Try to keep it down though, eh. Bit of a waste if you bring it all back up again."

"I'm not going to," Mitchell groaned wretchedly from the floor.

"Good. Seth would get in a right mood if I got him to clean up after you."

"I'm not going to drink from a living person," Mitchell ground out through clenched teeth.

"Hmm," Herrick pondered. "That could pose a problem. We don't mind bottle feeding you, so to speak, just to start with. Getting other vampires to do your hunting for you on an ongoing basis is going to be a no-no though, I'm afraid."

"I'm not going to drink blood. Not ever."

Herrick had a sinking feeling that his new recruit wasn't going to be as biddable as he had thought. This one was showing a disturbing trait of thinking for himself and Herrick wasn't sure he liked it. "But you have to feed." Herrick talked slowly and precisely as if to a small child, or an idiot. "If you don't feed you'll weaken. You'll be as good as dead anyway."

"If he's not going to finish up, can I have this one?" Seth asked from the far corner where he was bleeding a critically injured soldier into the empty mug: a soldier that he had got to before the stretcher bearers had carried away the casualties of another encounter that morning. Herrick ignored him and Seth glared at Mitchell before tucking in anyway; there was clearly going to be no love lost between the two of them. Seth fancied himself Herrick's right hand man and he already had an inkling that his position would be threatened by this youngster.

"It wasn't part of the deal. You said you'd kill me, turn me into one of you and I agreed. I never said I'd drink blood. And you can't force me." Mitchell sat up to face Herrick, stronger now that the blood was coursing through his system.

"Oh, Heaven forbid I should try to force feed you. You're only a bloody vampire, after all. Stands to reason you'd prefer meat and two veg. Crazy." Herrick turned away in disgust.

The three other vampires turned their attentions to the dying man in the corner, ensuring his blood didn't go to waste even if rejected by the newborn. The soldier's moans gradually weakened and eventually ceased altogether as they drained and finally discarded him. Sated, Herrick returned his attention to Mitchell, intending to begin his instruction in vampire ways, but found that he had slipped out into the darkness. They searched but he was nowhere to be found, and for all Herrick's rages and tantrums he had to admit that his new conscript had well and truly given him the slip.


	3. Chapter 3

**Still can't reply to reviews on this fic :( so please accept my thanks for all of them. Considering how unsure I was of it, I am thrilled that so many of you seem to be enjoying it - it makes the frustration worth while!**

**Mitchell's first attempt at "being human" in this section, with Herrick lurking in the background to reclaim him when it goes pear-shaped. **

**Herrick didn't feed me any one liners for this bit - sorry. ;-)**

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><p>Mitchell holed up for what remained of the night, only venturing out as the sun started to come up. More by luck than judgement he eventually found himself back at the site of the skirmish, where the burial party had arrived to complete the job started by Mitchell's men the day before. They were wary: curious about a man who stumbled out of the mists alone and unarmed, covered in blood and mud and disorientated and confused. There was a John Mitchell listed among the dead - his identification had been taken from him by what remained of his platoon yesterday – so they had to be convinced that it was indeed him, left for dead the previous day and miraculously come to among a heap of bodies. Convinced they were though, eventually, his return from the dead a matter for good cheer among the relentless despondency of their job.<p>

"Get yourself back to the aid post," said the captain, "I'm not sure how much of that blood is yours, but it's worth getting it looked at." Mitchell was sent back with one of the party accompanying him, and on the way back he managed to convince his companion that he was fine, that he wouldn't need to be checked by the medics, that he just wanted to rejoin his platoon. He wasn't sure what the medics would find, but he was sure they'd realise pretty quickly that he hadn't just had a lucky escape. He just wanted to hide, conceal himself amongst the living; keep his head down and try to get through this as best he could.

At first Mitchell could delude himself that all was well: that he could live as he had, but before many days had passed the hunger started to creep up on him. The blood that Herrick had fed him lasted him a while, and sheer force of will kept the cravings at bay for a little longer, through the remainder of his spell in the front line trenches and back into the reserves. His men had started to talk amongst themselves, he knew they had; their once gregarious platoon leader was becoming more and more withdrawn, keeping himself to himself. They muttered about shell shock, remarking that they had never thought to see Mitchell affected, cocky sod like him, but that waking up in a pile of bodies like that must have left him touched in the head.

On their precious rest days after reserve duty he would usually have been in the forefront of the group, doing his best to relax over a few glasses of the watery liquid that passed for beer in what was left of the nearby village and helping his men to unwind and keep morale as high as possible. Not this time: this time he sat alone, staring morosely into his glass and trying determinedly to block out the hammering of their hearts and the rush of the blood in their veins. Before long he snatched his jacket from the back of the chair and went to stand in the cool night air, lighting his next cigarette from the butt of the previous one. He was dimly aware of someone standing across the street, partly illuminated by a lamp. It was Herrick, the light casting strange shadows across his face. He raised two fingers to the peak of his forage cap in a mocking salute. No more than that: no attempt to talk to him, just letting Mitchell know that he was there, that he knew where Mitchell was, that he hadn't given up on him.

The knowledge sent chills down Mitchell's spine.

He went into his next rotation grimly single-minded. It was getting tougher: the hunger was setting in and he was finding it harder and harder to resist. The pulse of heartbeats had become a thundering in his ears and the smell of blood was like rose attar in his nostrils, sweet and cloying.

For the first time, Mitchell was glad of the conditions in which they lived. The stink of death and unwashed bodies and the acrid smell of cordite on the wind all served to mask the smell that was such a temptation, making his mouth water and his teeth ache and his eyes strain to turn vampire black.

His withdrawal had been remarked upon at higher levels now. His captain came to talk to him; he'd noticed that Mitchell was struggling since his experiences the last time in the front line. If he didn't snap out of it he'd have to refer him to the field hospital for evaluation, but in the meantime he should report to the regimental aid post: see if there was anything they could do for him. Mitchell tried to shake himself out of his torpor for a while after that, catching up on news from his men, finding out that there had been news of a home leave baby come through a week before that he had not heard about yet. That shook him; his only chance of clinging to his humanity was by mixing with people, doing human things with them, yet how could he when every conversation saw him holding onto his self control by his nail ends, desperately resisting the urge to savage and destroy his friends and comrades?

And in the back of his mind was Herrick: always Herrick. He jumped at shadows and saw him everywhere until he thought he was losing his mind. Whatever he said he wondered if Herrick was overhearing him; whatever he did he wondered if Herrick was watching. He began to dread his next rest days – would Herrick be there again, watching from under the lamp, waiting for his control to fail?

He had begun to accept that it _would_ fail for his strength was ebbing away. Every morning was torture to get himself up and moving and it was only a matter of time before he fell asleep at his post with the associated dire consequences. If he _was_ to fail he would do it his own way in his own time, not with a loss of control but with careful planning and the possibility of covering his tracks. He had always had an eye for the main chance – a seizer of opportunities – and he capitalised on that. He began to prepare, going daily to the aid post for tincture of valerian to treat what had become accepted as his shell shock. While he was there he slipped whatever drugs he could lay his hands on into his pocket – a little each day to try to avoid calling attention to himself. Often he didn't know what they were or what they were for, but where possible he targeted pain killers and sedatives: when he picked his victim they were what he would need. He chased the valerian with his daily ration of porter: the two combined seemed to have more of an effect than either of them separately, and they helped dull the hunger somewhat - most of the time.

The anticipated meeting happened on Mitchell's next rest leave. He'd gone into the bar, such as it was, with the men from his platoon. As they got more raucous heartbeats grew raised, temperatures elevated and Mitchell got more and more uncomfortable in their presence, so he slunk away to a seat at a table near the door by himself. A man slipped quietly from behind a table in an alcove where he had been sitting unobserved and approached Mitchell's table.

"I thought you'd turn up here soon," Herrick eased into a chair opposite Mitchell and slid a watery beer across the table towards him. "Your rotation has been pretty easy to guess, thankfully – a day or two here and there. Drink up. It's not laced with anything."

Mitchell looked sharply up at Herrick. "What do you mean by that?" Did he know of his plans? How could he?

"Nothing. Should I?" A hint of a smile flickered around Herrick's lips at the younger man's discomfiture.

Mitchell licked his lips and gulped several mouthfuls of the beer down. With a shaking hand he pulled a cigarette from his pocket, raised it to his lips, lit it and inhaled deeply. He closed his eyes and savoured the feeling. He wanted Herrick to go away and leave him alone. He wanted to talk to him more than anything.

"I must say you're more communicative than I was expecting. I've been asking around. Shell shock, they said: almost mute; waking up screaming. You're a mess, Mitchell. That's what you get for running out on me and trying to handle this by yourself."

"I'm all right," mumbled Mitchell, closing his eyes and exhaling a chestful of smoke.

"You're far from all right. You were pasty even when I recruited you – you look a thousand times worse now. Your eyes are sunken and you look like you're about to keel over. Have you really not fed yet?"

Mitchell glowered into his glass.

"Jesus Christ, Mitchell. Not many vampires could go this long without feeding, far less a new recruit. I'm impressed. But I still think you are mad. Let me see if I can tempt you." Herrick pushed a balaclava across the table towards him. It was dark and redolent with blood. "He tasted good, this chap. I thought you might like a sample."

Mitchell drew in a deep shuddering breath, inhaling the potent scent. His lips parted and he inhaled again, drawing the breath across his tongue, tasting the blood in the air. "Ah, Jesus," he breathed, leaning back in his seat and closing his eyes. He bit so hard on his lip that he could taste his own blood mingled with the flavour of the other.

Herrick smirked, his eyes glittering, knowing without seeing that behind the lids Mitchell's eyes were jet black and the tightly compressed mouth concealed a pair of fangs. "You want it, Mitchell, you know you do. You'll have to give in to it eventually." Mitchell jumped to his feet, flinging his chair back so vigorously that it fell to the ground with a crash that silenced the bar, and strode for the door. "You signed up for this, Mitchell. You can't get out of it this easily," called Herrick after him, fully aware that the others in the room were taking his words as an officer reprimanding someone suspected of cowardice. A long slow smile crossed his face. Yes, Mitchell would be back, and sooner rather than later.


	4. Chapter 4

**Final part, so if you've got this far thanks for reading! I love Mitchell and Herrick together, so I'm sure there will be some flashbacks to come from me in due course. Quite looking forward to tackling Mitchell in full-on Big Bad John mode. :-) **

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><p>Mitchell pulled the box out from under his bunk. Underneath the photos and the letters from home lay a random assortment of pills and powders. He had no idea what most of them were, but trusted that they would do the job.<p>

He opened one bag, wet the tip of a finger and drew out a little of the powder. He dabbed it on his tongue and pulled a face: shit, it was bitter. Arthur would taste that in tea; he'd not get enough into him to have an effect before he suspected something. He'd have to put it in his porter to stand a chance of masking the taste – come up with some reason why it was in his mug rather than out of the bottle. And Mitchell thought he'd have to do it soon – his control was weakening rapidly and better a planned kill than him losing his senses and ripping someone's throat out. If he was really lucky they'd think Arthur had committed suicide –chances were there would be enough morphine and codeine in the mixture to kill a man. He wondered briefly what effect the drugs in Arthur's bloodstream might have on him. Herrick had promised him that he couldn't die, apart from the 'small print', whatever that meant, but would it make him sluggish? Sleepy? It would all become clear in time, and then if he could hold out he might not have to think about it again for another four weeks, maybe even longer.

He barely slept that night, listening to the sounds of sleeping men around him and running through what he had to do in his head. Would he be able to tell where the jugular was? Would he be able to sense or feel it? He hoped that when it came to it, instinct would take over; how hard could it be, after all? Suddenly he realised why vampires took care of their own: a first kill was quite a daunting prospect.

While he was alone he ground down the tablets and mixed them with the powders, then put them in the bottom of the mug and poured in some of the stout, stopping to sniff suspiciously at it. It didn't smell bad but goodness knows how it would taste. He poured in the rest of the drink and stirred it quickly, then poured his own bottle into his mug. Best his drink look the same as Arthur's: less suspicious that way.

When Arthur returned he raised an eyebrow at the porter in the mug. "We expecting company?"

Mitchell's fingers clenched the mug tightly and he tried with all his might to stop his hand from shaking: both from nerves and from a barely suppressed urge to conjure up his fangs and sink them into his friend's neck right there and then. "Someone had dropped the bottles, I reckon. When I opened them they frothed up everywhere and the mugs were the nearest things to catch the spillage." Mitchell took a long drink from his mug and pulled a face, "Tastes godawful, too. Maybe this lot's off or something. Still, best drink it anyway – not like they'll give us any more if this is bad."

Arthur tried a sample of his and his mouth puckered in disgust. "Jesus, you're not kidding! I'm not drinking this muck. Are they trying to kill us with our beer now as well as everything else?"

"Sup it down, mate," Mitchell hated himself as he smiled at his victim, "you know they reckon it's good for us. Just get it down you and I'll mention to supplies that we got some dodgy ones. Come on, I'll race you to the bottom. If we throw it down we won't even taste it." They both gulped their beer down and slammed the mugs down on the wooden table.

Mitchell paced the room, eyeing Arthur nervously, and for a time Arthur watched him too. Mitchell knew that the men in his platoon had been worried about him of late and he made an effort to stop his pacing and try to relax. Relax! As if he could. Why the devil hadn't he lost consciousness yet – there was enough in that mug to stop an elephant in its tracks. He was acutely aware of Arthur's heart beating and spotted immediately when it started to slow and his breathing became shallower. The soldier's eyes rolled up into his head and his jaw slackened. Mitchell felt the side of his neck: alive but unconscious; this was it. His fingers trembled on the other man's skin; he could feel the throb of the pulse, blood flowing so tantalisingly just beneath the surface. Tears filled his eyes. "I'm sorry, Arthur, so very, very sorry. You deserved a better death than this."

At last he allowed himself to give in, eyes flicking to darkness and fangs descending ready to bite. He felt a final heady rush as he succumbed and suddenly the taste was on his tongue again. The taste from the mug Herrick had fed him from weeks before; the taste that had lingered on the air from the balaclava in the bar in the village. And it was so good. Ah Jesus, it was so good! He gulped hungrily, the blood rushing over his tongue and coating his throat with its sticky warmth. Arthur's body slumped in the seat, the last breath easing out of him as his heart failed. Mitchell drank his fill, stopping only when the pulse of blood slowed to a trickle.

The bite marks stood out livid against the waxy pallor of Arthur's skin and Mitchell gently rolled Arthur's head to one side to hide them from view. Oh God, what had he done? Arthur was his friend. The feelings hit him like punches: pity, shame, remorse; then yearning, hunger, desire. No longer swimming against the tide of his hunger but now carried along on its rip current: wanting blood, _needing_ blood in a completely different way. He knew the feel of it: knew how the ache for it sparked the gnawing in his guts and the crawling of his skin – the need for blood that at that moment overwhelmed every other thought in his head.

Arthur was the first but he wouldn't be the last. From the moment he'd made his pact with Herrick his fate had been sealed: to be a predator, no longer human. He wiped his mouth and Arthur's blood stained the back of his hand. Without hesitation Mitchell licked his skin, senses quivering at the smell and taste of fresh blood; the exhilaration again threatening to transform his eyes to darkest black.

He had to get out – the human side remained intact enough for him to realise that – he had to leave while he still could, before he killed another of his friends. He would go through the platoon like a forest fire, feeding and killing as he went; he knew that now. Whether this lust had been triggered by his long abstinence or whether all new vampires experienced the same powerful urges he didn't know. What he did know was that he had to go to Herrick. Herrick would shield him and teach him what he needed to know.

He opened the door and ran, with no thought in his head but to run back to where he had last seen Herrick. Gunfire whistled past him and he could hear the voice of his captain shouting after him. He couldn't go back now, even if he wanted to: not just a murderer but a deserter to boot. In that moment his shame was sealed.

"Tell me honestly, had you truly not fed until today?" Mitchell shook his head, scarcely managing to meet Herrick's eyes. "Impressive," commented Herrick, "most new vampires are taught to feed by their sire, of course. You, ah...absconded...before I got the chance, but even the reluctant ones rarely hold out more than a day or two."

Mitchell looked darkly at him from hooded eyes. "It was good, Herrick. I didn't know it would feel that way." His voice was husky with longing.

"It must have been bloody good after that long a wait. Who was it?"

"One of my men. My corporal. I drugged him and then drank from him. Then all I could think was that I needed to get to you. Help me, Herrick."

Herrick threw back his head and laughed, spluttering to a halt as the younger vampire stared bleakly at him. "Oh my, Mitchell, I'm sorry. You have to see the absurdity surely - that you gave yourself to save your men then chose one of them to feed on?" He chuckled again and slapped the younger man on the shoulder. "What delicious irony – very delicious if the look of you is anything to go by; you're wearing a fair bit of him. Still, you look a lot better with a square meal inside you."

"He wasn't enough," Mitchell said gruffly. "I want more. I _need_ more, Herrick." Mitchell's eyes turned to jet and he reeled as the yearning for blood hit him. The corner of Herrick's mouth quirked: yes, the transformation was complete, and what a transformation it appeared to have been.

"I'm sure we can raid the larder in the circumstances. Seth, I believe we have a guest we've been saving for a special occasion. Maybe we can treat Mitchell here to a snack." From an outhouse, Seth led a dazed soldier, in a battered and blood-stained uniform. They had found him wandering alone and had brought him back with them – another missing in action who would never be accounted for.

"I think we should let our new friend here do the honours," Herrick stood aside to give Mitchell sight of the man. "I'd normally give you a few pointers, you understand, but you seem to have worked the essentials out for yourself, so...tuck in." With a wave of his hand he invited Mitchell forward.

Mitchell smiled coldly. His eyes scorched black and his fangs glinted as he advanced on the soldier. Mitchell was vicious and merciless, tearing savagely at the soldier's throat as he raised his arms in front of his face in a feeble attempt to ward him off. When the screams had subsided and the body lay motionless in a widening puddle of blood, Mitchell straightened, turning to the others with blood running from his chin and an intoxicated look on his face. He wiped his mouth with the tips of his fingers and looked Herrick square in the eye. It seemed to Herrick that it was no longer the same man that stared back at him. This man was colder, harder, more resolute than the frightened soldier he had met four weeks before.

"That was fun. So, who's next?" The chilling smile that crossed Mitchell's face was matched quickly by one on Herrick's, a gleam of delight lighting up his eyes.

Four weeks. What was four weeks, Herrick mused, in the long life of a vampire? It appeared that John Mitchell would turn out to have been worth the wait.


End file.
